R.F. Kuang
R.F. Kuang
Author Overview By the Side Quest Book Club Podcast
“He’s got the personality of a wet towel: damp, and he clings.” ~ R.F. Kuang
Why we love R.F. Kuang
We're off to Telvarar to hang with Locke and Jean. In this episode of the SideQuest Book Club, we delve into Scott Lynch's Red Seas Under Red Skies, the second book in the Gentlemen Bastard series. The discussion highlights the tension in the prologue, the introduction of the Bonds Magi as a new threat (again!).
Author Highlights
Here is what you can expect from a R.F. Kuang story…
Complex, morally ambiguous characters
“Grimdark” fantasy
Historical and political commentary
Author Bio
Rebecca F. Kuang is the #1 New York Times and #1 Sunday Times bestselling author of the Poppy War trilogy, Babel: An Arcane History, Yellowface, and Katabasis (forthcoming). Her work has won the Nebula, Locus, Crawford, and British Book Awards. She was named to the 2023 Time100 Next list and the Forbes 30 Under 30 Class of 2024. A Marshall Scholar, she has an MPhil in Chinese Studies from Cambridge and an MSc in Contemporary Chinese Studies from Oxford. She is now pursuing a PhD in East Asian Languages and Literatures at Yale, where she researches Sinophone literature and Asian American literature.
This bio is taken from R.F. Kuang’s website.
Slava’s Thoughts
We tackled R.F. Kuang’s Katabasis on the podcast, and yeah, it took me a few chapters to warm up, but soon, I was all in. Grad students descending through a Dante-style hell to finish their theses? Academia-as-literal-underworld, complete with toxic advisors, impossible trials, and logic-paradox magic? It’s wild and clever.
Kuang swings big and lands it; one of the most original ideas I’ve read in years.
Jonathan’s Thoughts
My name is Jeff.
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